• by Sarah Mahoney  @mahoney_sarah, August 23, 2023

Ulta's virtual hair color tool

Though you might never guess from your Instagram or TikTok feed, America has an uneasy relationship with the looking glass. A new study finds that just 31% of people have a positive relationship with mirrors, with the balance unsettled by their reflection.

A new study from Within Health, an online eating disorder treatment program, also finds while selfies are still a thing, taken regularly by three in 10 people, only 13% typically post them on social media. When they don't post, it's usually because they don't like how they look.

The study also looked at the impact of filters and found that they distort perceptions, with 40% wishing they could look the same in real life as they do in a beauty filter. And 10% of the sample, which included 1,000 people, had tried TikTok's viral "bold glamour" filter.

"We hoped we would find that people feel positively about their look," says Rachel Kirsch, a data journalist at Within Health. "Unfortunately, we found one in 10 Americans are avoiding looking at themselves in the mirror at all. And 41% wish they looked the same as when using a beauty filter. So obviously, there is some sort of disconnect between what we want to see and what we see when we look in the mirror."

And while the researchers had an inkling that social media's impact on self-regard wouldn't be stellar, "I was surprised to the extent in which that hypothesis was confirmed, and the way these filters led to [people] feeling negatively about themselves."

The study determined that the more time people spend on social media, the more likely they are to avoid looking at themselves in the mirror, and more likely they are to be critical of their looks.

Members of Gen Z check themselves in the mirror most often, with 8% saying they do so at least 10 times a day. Gen X is the most mirror-averse. The average for all ages is between one and four times daily. Overall, women are somewhat more mirror-phobic than men, as are people who spend more than three hours a day on social media.

When people do look in the mirror, they are most likely to say they focus on things that make them feel insecure, starting with their weight (74%), acne (73%) and wrinkles (69%.) Features most likely to make people confident are eyes (57%), outfit (43%) and hair color (42%.) Women are more likely to hate their noses and skin, while men stress about their hairstyle and teeth. Millennials fret most about their wrinkles.

Part of the experiment involved people staring at their reflection for 30 seconds and then choosing adjectives to describe themselves. Women were ultra-harsh and most likely to say they were kind, fat or plain. Men described themselves as unique, thoughtful and handsome.

"Baby boomers had the most positive view of themselves, and they're also the most likely not to take selfies and not spend much time on social media," Kirsch tells Marketing Daily. And because their baby boomer friends also post fewer selfies, "they may not feel that same social pressure as younger people."

For those wrestling with eating disorders and distortions about how they look, "we wanted to present this research so people can see that many people feel this way. You're not alone. Millions of people across the country are struggling with this."

Kirsch says she hopes people can also be inspired by knowing that 47% of those in the survey believe they view themselves more negatively.

"There's an optimism there if they can acknowledge that they're being harder on themselves,” Kirsch says. “That can lead to more self-compassion."

And she hopes beauty brands get the message that people aren't as thrilled to play with digital tools as companies think.

It’s fine to "encourage people that it's not about looking a certain way, but about feeling beautiful and confident. Letting people try a lip color that matches an outfit and feels fun is one thing. That's different than saying, try this and pretend to look like the cover of Vogue."